Safe water that lasts, for every Australian community

Mapping and research. We learn from the lived experience of communities and the interrelated challenges they face, mapping every water source and need together, and co-designing the solution under the community’s own decision-making authority. The evidence this produces is community-level and community-owned: the community decides what is recorded, who holds it, and what is published

Predictive modelling. We plan for decades, not funding cycles. Our Predictive Iterative Sustainability Model rates a solution against 265 documented challenges^8, 9 and shows funders what the whole life of the system requires, before money is committed. Its weightings come from Nigerian evidence, so it will be adapted to the Australian context and validated with Australian partners

Architectural design. Every design starts from the local evidence, never a standard drawing: existing sources are assessed and the hazards known in that place shape the treatment approach. Contaminants like uranium and arsenic, and the Australian Drinking Water Guidelines, are new ground for us, so treatment design will be done with Australian engineers and the health regulator

Build to the approved design. We build to the community’s scale, not a city template. Most communities here already have pipes to houses, so the answer is usually improving and instrumenting the bore, treatment and network that exist. Where a new source is developed, its water is tested and the design adapts to what is found

Built to last, maintained locally. The build is a one-off cost, so the architectural design takes remoteness seriously and durability is engineered in from the start. A full-time local employee, the role our kiosk attendants hold in Nigeria, performs routine maintenance, supported by predictive maintenance from our post-construction tracking

Water Committee and paid local operator. Before launch, a resident is employed and trained to run the system, a community body oversees it, and how upkeep will be funded will be agreed with the community and the provider responsible for the asset. No system is ever left without someone responsible for it

Monitoring and tracking. Testing does not end at handover. Through our ongoing research we are piloting proxy testing: low-cost checks, matched to the risks of each water source type, that flag when water safety may be compromised and trigger a confirmatory laboratory test. Applied here, it would allow water quality to be tracked remotely and continuously, with laboratory testing used where it is needed most

Predictive maintenance from live data. Because every system’s performance is tracked, failure can be predicted before it happens: a flow dropping, a pump drawing more power, a pattern that precedes a breakdown. The repair happens early, before the water stops. Our aim is to keep project reliability above 98%

16+ metrics, reported to the community. Trust is rebuilt with evidence residents can see. Every site is tracked for its whole life, including whether people actually drink the water, not just whether it passes, and results are reported on the community’s terms